Andy Chase Is Back Daily On The Radio, Hosting The Night Show On 95-9 The Rat!
Andy Chase is Back!
Hunter S. Thompson wrote “The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs. There’s also a negative side.” I know this because for years it hung in the studio of the Rat. Music radio too, can be a tough sled.
There are more weirdos and people with bad intentions than good men and women in this business. Always has been. I consider myself one of those good men. Some may differ. However, this story isn’t about me or them. It’s about you, and one of your favorite radio personalities, and an around good guy, Andy Chase, returning to the airwaves with a major promotion. Andy Chase is the new 7-Midnight DJ on The Rat!
Who is Andy Chase?
Now I could give you the backstory I know about Andy. How He has lived in Chicago, New York City, started in Promotions, worked his way up over the years. Meh, that stuff is boring. Besides if you have lived, worked, partied, boated, or listened to the radio in Ocean County, well then you know exactly who Andy is! He’s as well known off the air as he is on, and I’m pretty sure right about now he could run for Mayor of Toms River and win. Everybody knows Andy. He’s a man of the people.
It’s Been A Long Road Back.
After his unceremonious departure from his Afternoon Show that he manned for a decade in the market, Andy put all of his efforts into his family’s fried chicken business to make money and keep busy, as well as one of his true passions, being a board member on Ocean Of Love, the wonderful charity helping families dealing with childhood cancer. Andy has told me that the hardest part of losing his radio gig was the fear that he would not be able to help those kids and their families. See? Told ya he was a good guy!
Well as luck would have it, Andy was good friends with Matt Knight, the bald-headed Wunderkind of Programming at our sister station 100.1 WJRZ. Chase and Knight became friends long ago at a radio station, when as an intern for Knight, Andy would screen Matt’s female groupies during his night show. That friendship came in handy, as Matt hired Andy to do part-time weekend work for WJRZ, keeping “his feet wet” in the business for a couple of years.
Then, when the overnight position opened last year at the RAT, Andy was asked if he would do it. Even though it was tough with his regular job, Andy, in true Andy style did it, and did it well. So well in fact, that when our friend The Minister decided to leave the night show last month to pursue his music management passions, Andy was the clear choice to grab the reigns and take the Rat’s Night Show to new heights! In addition to being on the Rat, Andy has been instrumental in helping Gotts & the Rat continue his dream of raising thousands of dollars for Ocean Of Love with our Billboard Radiothon each September.
So if you see Andy and his buddy Winston around this summer, at a Rat gig, the bar, boardwalk, or boat, be sure to say Welcome Back, Man… Make that Welcome Back, Good Man.
You know, I have one more quote for you about radio.
It hangs on the wall of my production studio at the Rat. It’s a quote from Jean Sheppard from 1970. You may know Jean as the narrator of “A Christmas Story”. He was a great radio man back in the day. Anyway, Jean’s quote was ” Radio is the best medium. When you listen, it’s just you and me. There we are together, alone in the car. My voice is all around you, and you are all around me. You’re in your small space, and I’m in mine. Radio is fantastic.”
